Body and soul 1947 - One of the greatest boxing movies of all time

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IMDB rating: 7,8

Director: Robert Rossen
Main Cast: John Garfield, Lilli Palmer, Hazel Brooks, Anne Revere, William Conrad

"This riveting 1947 drama, regarded by many as the greatest boxing movie of all time, centers on a former pugilist who looks back on his life in and out of the ring and realizes that self-respect is a more important prize than winning. John Garfield is Charlie Davis, a former boxing champion who began fighting in order to save himself and his mother from poverty after his father was killed in a mob-related bombing. William Conrad plays Quinn, a veteran boxer-turned-trainer who discovers that Davis has the potential to be a professional fighter. Eager to take on all contenders, Davis eventually defeats the world champion, but winning has cost him more than he bargained for. He falls in with the mob and takes to a life of easy women and plentiful booze, winning easy bouts with second-rate opponents. In the end, Davis realizes the error of his ways - but is it too late? With all the odds against him, and knowing that the fight has already been fixed, Davis is forced to make the choice between what's expected of him and what he expects of himself.
 Body and Soul benefits from a riveting screenplay by Abraham Polonsky, intense editing from Francis D. Lyon and Robert Parrish, and innovative cinematography by the legendary James Wong Howe. Tying all of these elements together is director Robert Rossen, who coaxes a superb performance from John Garfield as the troubled boxer Charlie Davis. Rossen would explore similar themes of redemption in sports and gambling in 1961's The Hustler. Howe's tight shot composition would influence similar classics over the years, most notably Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull." - www.allmovie.com

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The postman always rings twice 1946 - Garfield and Turner are terrific

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IMDB rating: 7,6

Director: Tay Garnett
Main Cast: Lana Turner, John Garfield, Cecil Kellaway, Hume Cronyn, Leon Ames

"A classic 1940s film noir, The Postman Always Rings Twice is shot through with an overwhelming sense of the inevitability of fate. In the tradition of Greek tragedy, characters who appear to be in control of their fates turn out to be trapped and compelled by urges beyond their control. They are attractive but flawed, and corrupt at a level so basic that no amount of absolution can cleanse them of their sins. Lana Turner is so magnetically attractive that it is easy to see why John Garfield's character is so quick to fall under her charms and into her arms. Garfield does a capable job of portraying his character's basic moral neutrality: he will do what has to be done, not because it is right or wrong, but simply because it is what must be done. The Macbeth-like plotting of the lovers leads to the predictable recriminations and double-crosses. Even in noir, evil is punished. Eventually. Sort of. The passions that drive the couple to murder are the same fates that manipulated Macbeth, but, in both cases, the characters must pay a price for their weaknesses. The relentless intensity of the Turner-Garfield relationship has rarely been matched on screen. The taut script by Harry Ruskin was based on the novel by noir-meister James M. Cain (Double Indemnity, Mildred Pierce), and director Tay Garnett carefully evokes all the conventions of the genre without expanding them." - www.allmovie.com

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Four daughters 1938 - Garfield introduced a new kind of rebellious acting style

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030149/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
IMDB rating: 7,1

Director: Michael Curtiz
Main Cast: Claude Rains, John Garfield, Priscilla Lane, Rosemary Lane, Lola Lane, Gale Page, Frank McHugh, May Robson

"Fannie Hurst's Sister Act was the source for this money-making Warners weeper. The four daughters of the title are played by the Lane Sisters - Priscilla, Rosemary and Lola - and by Gale Page. All are musical prodigies, and all are daughters of master-musician Claude Rains. John Garfield makes his movie debut (no, he wasn't in 1933's Footlight Parade) as an embittered piano genius. Garfield has us in the palm of his scruffy hand the moment he begins philosophizing about the fates: 'So they flipped a coin... heads he's poor, tails he's rich... they flipped a coin - with two heads'. Aware that he can bring only unhappiness to Priscilla Lane, the daughter who cares most for him, Garfield obligingly drives into a heavy snowstorm and is killed in an auto accident (but it's not staged as a suicide, lest the Hays Office spank). John Garfield made so powerful an impression in Four Daughters that Warners was compelled to write him into the sequel Four Wives, first as a flashback and then as (implicitly) a ghost. Another film, Daughters Courageous, was hastily constructed using the same cast, but with different character names so as to accommodate a happier denouement for Garfield and Lane. Four Daughters was remade in 1954 as Young at Heart, with Frank Sinatra and Doris Day in the John Garfield and Priscilla Lane roles." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/four-daughters-v18310

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